Athens: Conservative leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis slammed critics of the rescue effort as authorities continued to look for victims and survivors of a trawler that sank off the coast of Greece with as many as 750 migrants on board.
At a campaign stop in the town of Sparta, Mitsotakis advised naysayers to direct their anger at traffickers, whom he referred to as "human scum." On Wednesday, the ship went down.
The Greek coast guard reported on Saturday that a Greek Navy frigate and four other vessels were cruising 54 miles (87 kilometres) southwest of Pylos, Greece, at a distance of 47 nautical miles. The coast guard and navy both contributed two helicopters earlier to the operation.
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The rescue effort is occurring in waters that are over 5,000 metres (3 miles) deep in the Mediterranean Sea, in rough seas, and in winds that are nearly gale-force.
104 survivors have been saved so far, and 78 bodies have been found. Up to 750 people from Pakistan, Syria, Egypt, the Palestinian territories, and Syria were on board the trawler. Since the accident day, neither survivors nor bodies have been discovered.
The survivors have been transported to a centre for migrants outside of Athens. Some have had relatives from other European nations pay them visits. 43 Egyptian migrants, including minors, who survived the shipwreck were listed by the Egyptian embassy in Athens on Saturday. The list reveals that the survivors are all male residents of Cairo and the Nile Delta provinces of Sharqia and Menofia. The list, according to the embassy, was given by Greek authorities.
However, due to their slow response, Greek authorities continue to draw flak. Non-governmental organisations claim they received a number of calls for assistance, despite the fact that they claim the migrants insisted they didn't need any help.
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It is extremely unfair for some 'people in solidarity' to imply that the Coast Guard failed to perform its duty. These individuals are out there battling the waves to save lives and defend our borders, according to Mitsotakis.
The main opposition party Syriza was criticised by Mitsotakis for its own record on migration while in power. Mitsotakis is the favourite to win a second four-year term in the elections on June 25.
"Those who today present themselves as the so-called real humanitarians are the ones who approved the existence of detention facilities like Moria. They are the same people who were recently found guilty by the European Court of Human Rights of violating human rights at Moria.
A three-party coalition led by New Democracy established the notoriously overcrowded migrant camp of Moria in January 2013 on the island of Lesbos near the Turkish coast. During the 2015 migration crisis, it experienced an increase in population. It was operational from 2015 to 2019 under the Syriza government before burning down in September 2020. It was estimated that 20,000 people were living in a camp that could only hold 3,000 people just before it happened.
Aside from criticising Syriza for "opening the doors to millions of people" in 2015, Mitsotakis also defended his own more stringent policies and vowed to keep them in place.
"We adopted a different immigration policy, one that was fair and strict and involved border monitoring and protection. "A policy that led to a 90% reduction in illegal crossings," he told the crowd. "Europe has acknowledged that this policy is the best course of action. Because if we open Europe's borders to everyone, both the number of people trying to cross the Mediterranean and the likelihood of tragic shipwrecks will increase dramatically.
96 migrants were successfully rescued on a sailboat in Italy on Saturday after being abandoned more than 100 nautical miles (115 miles; 185 kilometres) from land by a coast guard vessel from the port of Roccella, in Calabria.
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The rescue was challenging due to the rough seas, but it was successful thanks to the assistance of a Portuguese coast guard vessel working for Frontex, the EU's border agency, and several commercial vessels.
Italian authorities alerted their Greek counterparts on Friday to the presence of a sailboat close to the scene of Wednesday's catastrophe. The sailboat was being watched by the Greek coast guard and was sailing normally. A spokesperson assumed it was the same boat that was saved off the coast of Italy on Saturday but was unable to confirm it